Wink, Wink
by Ani Medley
Summary: Eight heroes and one scholar. Four beds. One inn. How do Felix, Isaac, and company figure out sleeping arrangements?


A/N: A one-shot regarding a forum topic I saw once lighting on the subject we all blissfully ignored for some time: Inn beds! This story tries to cover what probably happens, more or less. (If you have been to that certain forum topic and seen the unedited version of my work, you'd know this well.) And no, there isn't going to be PG-13 rated stuff in here, as it wasn't in the last work.

Granite: She's a prude, you know.

Me: (Turns beet red) Excuse me!

Granite: Well, really, you've never published--or written--a fic with anything more than just mild flirting. When are you going to mature?

Me: (Hefting the SFPoD and smiling sweetly) After I use this on you, little cute rock-head. (Ponders) Your head really is made of rock, right? Even if you do look cute and furry on the outside?

Granite: (Gulps and vanishes into the Limbo Realm of Muses)

Me: (Laughing) Good thing they haven't found out the Muse Protection thingamajigee whatever...Seems that blackmailing is the only way to get anything out of 'em. (Yells) And turn on that disclaimer machine, will ya?

Granite: (Yelling back) Doing so!

**-BEEPBEEPSWISHSWISHRUFFLECRACK-**

Disclaimer Machine: **-Beep-** Golden Sun, the cast, **-Beep-** the characters, and **-Beep-** the settings do not belong to **-Beepbeepbeep-** Ani Medley. So do not sue.

Me: (Muttering) I need to fix that stupid thing one of these days...

**--o--**

"Excuse me," Felix said, tapping the innkeeper's shoulder and shooting a nervous glance at Isaac at the same time. It was fairly apparent he still hadn't gotten over the fact that he basically had his enemy to his back, even if it was a former enemy. "We did pay for the rooms, you know..."

The innkeeper threw up his hands in resignation. "I'm sorry," he said blandly, "but we're a little short on beds." He glanced at Jenna, Sheba, and Mia, and the smirk he gave at them made the three girls bristle like cornered cats. "Some of you may have to sleep..._together_."

The implications of that statement were not lost on the nine. Kraden and Picard exchanged smirks. Isaac alternated between paling and blushing, his ambivalent features resembling splotched strawberry cheesecake pudding even as he looked at Mia, who was mercifully just blushing. Ivan's jaw dropped, and he avoided looking at Sheba so purposefully he might as well have stared at her, which caused Felix's lip to tighten with disapproval and mild jealousy. Jenna uttered a series of strangled noises as she shot a sidelong glare at Garet, muttering for all the room to hear. "Sleeping together with that big oaf?" She growled. "Not on _my_ watch."

"Why, Jenna," Garet protested amid knowing grins, "me? A big oaf? When have you--Ow!" Jenna's kick to his shin caused him to hop, stumble, and trip over a bed, crashing to the floor, upending a bookshelf and a stack of boxes in the process.

The innkeeper flinched as he witnessed the "big oaf" accidentally wreak devastation in his inn, and he was about to open his mouth to discuss prices again when a bag of gold thumped on the table. The man's eyes goggled; this was probably the amount of gold he would produce in a month, and these adventurers called it up like it was nothing!

"We'll take it," Felix said shortly, even as he turned his back to hide the grin he knew was spreading on his face.

**----**

"I am NOT sleeping with him!" Jenna said hotly, glaring at Isaac. "He smells like a year-old manure midden"--"_I do not!_" Isaac yelped, anguished--"his dumb yellow scarf tickles my nose, and he snores like someone murdering a cat on a rusty fence!"

"But Jenna," Sheba said innocently. "Aren't you and Isaac an...item? And besides, he's much more interesting than Garet, don't you think?"

"Besides," Picard added dryly, "we have about three witnesses who can attest you basically admitted to liking him."

It was Jenna's turn to yelp, "I do not!"

"Do so!" Sheba teased, sticking out her tongue and leaping out of staff-range when the Mars Adept growled dangerously.

Felix snickered, hoping Jenna hadn't heard, and having that hope dashed when she turned on him. "How about you and Sheba?" She said snidely. "Aren't you and she an...item, so you say?"

It was Sheba's and Felix's turn to turn red. "_We are not!_" They protested in unison, then paled when they realized what the other had just said.

The discussion was well on its downhill way when Kraden decided to douse the fires. "Why don't we draw straws?" The scholar suggested.

"We're not getting anywhere arguing, and no one can blame a straw to decide," Picard added. Noticing three scowls aimed at his direction, he added innocently, "What's wrong?"

**----**

"Short," Felix said dryly, staring at the small stalk of withered grass. "Guess I'm sleeping on the ground. Again."

"Haven't years of living in the wilderness suited you to sleeping on hard areas?" Isaac asked mildly, waving his short straw. Felix scowled darkly and stalked off, with a muttered excuse of "I'm gonna check on the floor". _As if he needs to know more!_

"I get a bed!" Garet whooped, and jumped all over the place, causing the floor to creak dangerously and people to back away from him. It was cut short--not too mercifully--by him tripping over his own bed and landing face first, amid eye-rolls and grins.

"Nice," Jenna said between snickers. "The big fat oaf gets a bed, while I get a stupid hard splinter-filled floor." She glared at her short stalk as if it was mocking her. "At least Picard, due to his current _incapacitated_ state, gets one for free." With a sniff, she stormed off.

"What about my dignity?" Garet howled in mock anguish from his prone position on the bed.

"You can dump it in a barrel of horse leavings and hang it to dry!" Came Jenna's roar.

"Aw, man!"

"I think it's time we'd better head off to sleep," Felix said dryly, having slipped back in the crowd. Isaac nodded, and the two walked off, as discreetly as possible. No sooner had they stepped out of the doorway when there was a protesting groan that only a female could master.

Isaac inclined a head, and smiled. "Judging by the sound, I think Mia's going to have a sore back by the time we get up." Another despairing sigh followed the groan. "Plus Kraden."

**----**

"Is she always like this?" Isaac wondered out loud with a grin as she watched Jenna storm out of the room after cursing at length for some time regarding the state of the floor she had to sleep in, the airy blankets, and the virtual lack of hygiene to speak of.

"You haven't seen the worst of her yet," Felix said dryly, looking up at the ceiling, barely regarding the floor digging into his back. "If you want my opinion, you're getting the mildest of Jenna you could see. She even makes me squirm, and not because she's my sister with those big eyes trying to get her way all the time. Even the Briggs incident didn't teach her to be quiet." A chuckle. "If Jenna starts looking at you, Isaac, I'd advise you to run to Prox. No, Apojii Islands. She'll make you glad you did so."

"I'll take that as a yes. Oh, look." Isaac looked at the doorway beyond them, and Felix followed his gaze to the two Jupiter Adepts, who were chatting with each other and waving long straws. "They get beds."

"Don't you think life is unfair sometimes?" Felix muttered.

Silence, then a sigh. "Felix, life has handed me more than I could think of, some of it isn't good. Don't make it worse than it should be. Be surprised we're all still alive. One of us could have died on the way, or all of us, or in some monster's stomach, or..."

"I get the worst of it." Felix's voice was bitter, cutting. "You spent seventeen years in relative peace at Vale. I spent fourteen at the same state, and Saturos and Menardi--as well as I--took care of that quickly, so you can say I don't have a childhood at all. I bet while I'm learning to tell the difference between a hawthorn and a gooseberry bush and learning to clip a duck's head with a bow and arrow at three hundred paces, you're spending a fine time back in your home." A sigh. "I can't think of Jenna, Vale, and your company without feeling...what's the word..."

"Queasy."

"Yeah, queasy. And--"

"We'll talk about this later." Isaac yawned. "We need to sleep, anyways. You said you'll show me Lemuria, and I obviously can't sleepwalk there. Hopefully it's as beautiful as you described it."

Felix chuckled. "Oh, Isaac, you don't know the half of it. Why, I--"

"Not now. Your mental worries is going to give me insomnia one of these days." A yawn. "G'night, Felix."

"Night, Isaac."

They were drifting off when a familiar _femme fatale_'s voice shattered their bliss.

"You OAF! You fell all over me!" Fire Psynergy filled the room adjacent to theirs.

"Ow! Ow! Ow!" Garet yelped in agony. "I'll get off you! I just fell off the bed! Ow!"

"Next time, DON'T DO THAT AGAIN!"


End file.
